problem with my camera the night before vacation :(

[nick101181]

I have a samsung hi-8 camcorder with lcd viewfinder and after a year and a half of working fine, we turned it on to see a screen that was half white across the bottom and black across the top. We can play stuff back fine but nothing shows up in the viewfinder or lense at all. Any ideas and is it something I could fix or do I have to get it repaired? thanks

[papakilo]

Cheaper and better to buy a new one than get one that old repaired.. After a length of time the capacitors in most sophisticated electronics gear will begin to die. In most cases for consumer electronics it is far cheaper to replace than to repair.

[hsugawar]

Try removing the battery and leave it unplugged for one hour. Put the battery back. This might help...

Oh, don't forget to restore date/time and other parameters manually.

hiro